The Abused Goddesses and the Fissures of Referentiality
Prasanta Chakravarty The Abused Goddesses advertising campaign (http://www.buzzfeed.com/regajha/indias-incredibly-powerful-abused-goddesses-campaign-condemn) has given rise to strong reactions in the virtual space. While some initial reactions on the campaign were cautiously positive, albeit with some amount of unarticulated unease, soon the discursive feminist space on the internet articulated its reservations against the campaign powerfully and in no uncertain terms. If the advertising agency and the people behind it think that all publicity is good publicity then it is entitled to think so naively. That is hardly the point—that is, merely making an ‘impact’ through bad publicity or controversy. The success and failure of the campaign depends on many variables and the jury is still out. But it is not just about whether those images are ‘reaching a target spectatorship’ but about trying to understand the context, timing and also the modes of representation. In this case, the detractors tell us that using such battered images and narrative in order to make a case against domestic violence is shady and untrustworthy at several levels. First, contextually, the organization behind this campaign is a deeply conservative one which is trying to cash in on drawing our attention to such retrogressive images of womanhood, women as distant and glorified goddesses. The organization funding it: Save Our Sisters—the very name betraying the worst kind of infantilizing and patronizing NGO activity that is rife when such organizations, flushed with funds and a civilizing missionary zeal undertake to save backward, unenlightened nations such as ours. Taproot, the advertising agency behind the campaign seems to be playing right into the hands of people having such disturbing motivations. In addition to patronizing, in this case the narrative is orientalised rather crassly, it would seem. This is a problem that the feminists have been alive to right from the initial stages of the movement: that the latent codes of protective chivalry and spin thereof not only fortify established domestic structures and hierarchies but may hide within themselves a culture of perversity against its victims privately. Such secret perversity is perpetrated by highlighting the exaggerated, hyperbolic mode of socially representing women as unattainable and chaste creatures. For example, one may ask whether a lascivious hunter mentality lurks beneath when the god-man highlights chastity in women and concomitant asceticism in men, taking quick protective cudgels on behalf of the entire womenfolk. There is something dubious in the very language that argues for such purity. Even as such false glorification goes on in public, battering, maiming and abuse may go on unchecked within. As it often does. The reprehensible nature of such enterprise needs to be marked, identified and brought to notice. Again and again. In some parts of the West, (particularly in Northern Europe and the Low countries) democratization and reformed modes of Christianity have been able to exorcise such forms of ‘medievalism’. Until forms of irrationality and monstrosity erupt again. Individual acts of violence and passion sometimes take collective shape from time to time. They surprise us with their staying power. But just like these advertisements are not just about their impact, they are also not necessarily and purely about the motivations of this or that dubious organization. I wonder whether there is more to it than to be ‘for’ or ‘against’ such representations; representations that are likely to come back to us in future too in new ways. And not necessarily from such missionaries either. How can this event and act of representation be historicised by not radically separating the practices of social agents from their multiple identities in their dynamic, active culture but by prolonging personal and collective memory? This is something that I wish to talk about, namely, the simultaneity of presence, absence and anteriority in a chain of a narrative about memory in acts of representations. And what might be the secrets of the represented object with the operations of representing? Is it of any use to the feminist discourse if we are able to read the discourse of infantilizing by taking it to its logical extreme, that is, by marking the traces of the monstrous and perverse within the interstices of representation and history? The Mnemonic Image The idea of mythical images taking a full shape would appreciate its Janus faced double-handedness: on one hand is the enactment of the mimetic art of likeness, by giving proportion and depth to the models and thus claiming a certain kind of iconic realism. But images of worship, the miraculous eruptions that sustain the validity of such images also simultaneously produce an appearance and simulacrum—a metaphysical excess by which proportion no longer remain natural. Images spill over. Images of worship then may become monstrous or sublime or serene which may again be accompanied by simultaneous forms of monstrosity. There are times when the mimetic may exceed its original purpose and become expressive or both tendencies may create a productive tension within an act of representation. It is here that eikestic art may relate to the fantastic. History marries form. It is upon this wilful deception, relying on a Coleridgean sense of willing suspension of disbelief, that the whole idea of relating to images and icons and relics and symbols stand or fall. The binary division of history and mythography is suspended and the material nature of irrationality is brought before our senses in its full force when the idea of the mnemonic image begins to take shape. If it happens purely at the terrain of the image, it sidesteps the temporal, historical dimension. That is private aesthetic. But if we provide history with movement and simultaneity then the mnemonic may serve other functions. Many cultures live in simultaneous time. So, we say that such and such person has a feudal mindset or such and such is thoroughly modern in her outlook or in fashioning herself. Many temporal varieties of people make our world and therefore, each one of us may hide multiplicity of temporality within us too. What happens to representations when we come to them from our various selves? Carlo Ginzburg
Coldness and Cruelty: Two Contracts of von Sacher-Masoch
I Contract between Mrs Fanny von Pistor and Leopold von Sacher-Masoch On his word of honour, Mr Leopold von Sacher-Masoch undertakes to be the slave of Mrs von Pistor, and to carry out all her wishes for a period of six months. On her behalf, Mrs von Pistor shall not demand anything of him that would dishonor him in any way (as a man or as a citizen). Moreover, she shall allow him six hours a day for his personal work, and shall never look at his letters and writings. On the occurrence of any misdemeanor or negligence or act of lèse majesté, the mistress (Fanny von Pistor) may punish her slave (Leopold von Sacher-Masoch) in whatever manner she pleases. In short, the subject shall obey his sovereign with complete servility and shall greet any benevolence on her part as a precious gift; he shall not lay claim to her love nor to any right to be her lover. On her behalf, Fanny von Pistor undertakes to wear furs as often as possible, especially when she is behaving cruelly. At the end of the six months, this period of enslavement shall be considered by both parties as not having occurred, and they shall make no serious allusion to it. Everything that happened is to be forgotten, and the previous loving relationship restored. These six months need not run consecutively: they make be subject to interruptions beginning and ending according to the whims of the sovereign lady. We, the undersigned, confirm this contract, FANNY PISTOR BAGANOW LEOPOLD, KNIGHT OF SACHER-MASOCH Came into operation 8th December 1869. ———————————————————————— II Contract between Wanda and Sacher-Masoch My Slave, The conditions under which I accept you as my slave and tolerate you at my side are as follows: You shall renounce your identity completely. You shall submit totally to my will. In my hands you are a blind instrument that carries out all my orders without discussion. If ever you should forget that you are my slave and do not obey me implicitly in all matters, I shall have the right to punish and correct you as I please, without your daring to complain. Anything pleasant and enjoyable that I shall grant you will be a favour on my part which you must acknowledge with gratitude. I shall always behave faultlessly toward you but shall have no obligations to do so. You shall be neither a son nor a brother nor a friend; you shall be no more than my slave groveling in the dust. Your body and your soul too shall belong to me, and even if this causes you great suffering, you shall submit your feelings and sentiments to my authority. I shall be allowed to exercise the greatest cruelty, and if I should mutilate you, you shall bear it without complaint. You shall work for me like a slave and although I may wallow in luxury whilst leaving you in privation and treading you underfoot, you shall kiss the foot that tramples you without a murmur. I shall have the right to dismiss you at any time, but you shall not be allowed to leave me against my will, and if you should escape, you hereby recognize that I have the power and the right to torture you to death by the most horrible methods imaginable. You have nothing save me; for you I am everything, your life, your future, your happiness, your unhappiness, your torment and your joy. You shall carry out everything I ask of you, whether it is good or evil, and if I should demand that you commit a crime, you shall turn criminal to obey my will. Your honour belongs to me, as does your blood, your mind, and your ability to work. Should you ever find my domination unendurable and should your chains ever become too heavy, you shall be obliged to kill yourself for I will never set you free. “I undertake, on my word of honour, to be the slave of Mrs Wanda von Dunajew, in the exact way that she demands, and to submit myself without resistance to everything she will impose on me.” DR. LEOPOLD, KNIGHT OF SACHER-MASOCH ————————————————————————————————————————————— Leopold von Sacher-Masoch was born in 1835 in Lemberg, Galicia. He was of Slav, Spanish and Bohemian descent. His ancestors held official positions in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. His father was Chief of Police of Lemburg, and as a child he witnessed prison scenes and riots which were to have a profound effect on him. He was appointed Professor of History at Graz and began his literary career by writing historical novels. He met with rapid success: one of his first genre novels, The Divorced Woman (1870) aroused interest even in America. …In the language of Masoch’s folklore, history, politics, mysticism, eroticism, nationalism and perversion are closely intermingled, forming a nebula around the scenes of flagellation; he was consequently disturbed when Krafft-Ebing [Text-book of Insanity, 1879; Psychopathia Sexualis, 1886] used his name to designate a perversion. Masoch was famous and honored as a writer. Masoch’s tastes in matters of love are well known: he enjoyed pretending to be a bear or a bandit or having himself pursued, tied up and subject to punishments, humiliations and even acute physical pain by an opulent fur-clad woman with a whip; he was given to dressing up as a servant, making use of all kinds of fetishes and disguises, placing advertisements in newspapers, signing contracts with the women in his life and if need be prostituting them. An affair with Anna von Kottowitz inspired The Divorced Woman, another affair, with Fanny von Pistor, Venus in Furs. Then a young lady by the name of Aurore Rumelin approached him by means of a somewhat ambiguous correspondence, took the pseudonym of Wanda, and married Masoch in 1873. As a companion she was at once docile, demanding and overwhelmed. Masoch was fated to be disappointed as though the masquerades he planned were bound to give rise to misunderstandings. He was
Buddhi-jibi: A Cursory Sketch from Bengal
Swapnamoy Chakraborty [Swapnamoy Chakraborty is one of the finest fiction writers and essayists of contemporary Bengal. This article appears in the recent Special Issue on Intellectuals in the Bangla magazine Anustup, Pre-Saradiya edition, 2013. Our thanks to Anil Acharya for allowing HUG to translate and publish it.] ———————————————– I have no clue when the word buddhi-jibi got an entry into the Bangla lexicon. I am not much of a scholar. But this much is apparent that it tries to draw equivalence with the word intellectual. Just found out from my English-Hindi dictionary that one translation for intellectual in Hindi is buddhi-baaz. But it is not in use. Sometimes buddhi-jivi is used—true, but not widely enough and besides, it smacks of something stilted and quasi academic. I know that in Oriya the use of buddhi-jibi is a Bangla influence, for good or bad. Intelligentsia is an English word. It is well in use. Intellectual is French. It possibly comes to French tongue as antellectual. This word has lost credence in Bangla and has turned into the pejorative antel, used in its many contours: Look, there goes an antel—Noun That is an antel film—Adjective Antels sport a beard on their chin—Pronoun There ought to be a limit to this kind of antlami/antlamo –Verb Suppose you hear such expressions—“The boy has an antel antel tendency’ or that “He is antelossho antel” , they are bound to remind you of a face that is not very enthusiastic about shaving, prefers black coffee, is mostly unhappy with whatever is happening around him and conjures up dour and sour expressions out of nowhere. We call this kind of people antel but they themselves will hardly be happy with such a description. They do not admit of their being antel—this is one feature that marks the antel. True—no one is born antel or wakes up one fine morning transformed into one. We often get to hear this line in Hindi films: “Mein ma bannewali hun.” (I am about to be a mother). That condition ensued by some strange stroke of happy work. But no one will say “Mein antel bannewala hun.” (I am about to turn into an antel). Bannewali is also very much on. To become an antel is a process. One pickles into one. There is almost a Pavlovian ambience to this slow change that transforms one into an antel. Say, the percentage of antels you will see among the students of Jadavpur University will surely be far more than what can be traced in Gour Banga University? The number of antels in and around Dover Lane will far outnumber those that one might stumble upon at Gulu Ostagar Lane? But how does one measure such intellectuals? There is no antelometer, akin to a barometer. So you have to look for symptoms; like one seeks them out in a malarial patient. Those who regularly visit the Rabindra Sadan area, impelled by oodles of freely available affection, have nicknamed the place Sadan. Yes, just Sadan. Unadulterated Sadan (like there is no Stephens but only College, or just Post and no Washington Post). There are a few odd ‘pockets’ in this Sadan. In one such niche you can spy the television serial folks, in another—sundry elocutionists & recitation artists in a huddle and yonder, the obligatory poet’s corner! And then the ubiquitous band-singers and the gay rights activists. So that’s where our antels meet up in Kolkata. Of course, old school folks still like to stroll up to the Indian Coffee House on College Street but that’s kind of degenerate now: a dugout for the ‘frastu’ or ‘frusth’, as they say. Going downhill, in spite of the refurbishing and so on. The Sadan is in its ascendency. Then there are other antels whom you can trace at Tollygunj or in some other city studios. Honestly I do not know these joints. Such folks were not really among buddhi-jibis. They have turned themselves into being antels, of late. The way King Ballal Sen, by his magic wand, had crafted some groups as kulin and others as jal-achal-shudra. They turned into buddhi-jibis during the pre-parivartan days by such a magic wand wielded by our jana-netri—people’s leader. And some odd, juvenile filmmakers have ever since joined the bandwagon. Yes, Tollygunj also produces some ubiquitous experts these days. They opine. But antels abound in the bars regardless. Olympia bar is the signal one—once again affectionately called Olypub. The antels have long abandoned the desi liquor joints, like Khalasitola, quite popular in the sixties. Freshly minted antels do not take such a chance. Why? Take a guess, if you want! Among other things the nature of the Panjabi (kurta) defines the category. Panjabi over jeans, somewhat jaded—aspiring poet most certainly. Panjabi over jeans, colourful with some artwork—film or television wallah. And in case the hair is ponytailed—surely editor or photographer. Though the union minister and actor Ajit Panja would also sport a ponytail (he would act in the role of Ramakrishna.) But then, he was a man of action, of a different kind. Then there are other panjabis, made prominent with blazing verses. These are vachik artists. Deeper colours and embroidered panjabis would mean vocal artists or musicians. Lefties used to don khaddar at some point: panjabi and pajama. Not anymore. I often see CPM folks in safari suits. One cannot distinguish people of that ilk anymore. At one point everyone used to be CPM. Landlord and tenant. Jotedaar and peasant. Factory owner and millworker. Bus owner and khalashi. Dialectical relationships all. Each drew their subjectivity from their obverse and everyone was hurtling towards the world spirit of CPM. Then we had derivative CPM fellow travelers: total CPM, still CPM, dissenting CPM, anti CPM, all defined by the unifying base term. But the TMC fellow travelers and buddhi-jibis can be detected by their definitive clothing. White panjabi, collar raised. With attitude. May be sometimes green instead of white. That you cannot be called a buddhi-jibi worth your salt with your
Manpari Days
Kritika Chettri [Kritika Chettri did her masters in English literature from the University of Delhi. She has been a close spectator, follower and active supporter of the Gorkhaland movement] —————————————– Manpari Busty had sprung up overnight like lilies on the hillside after a rainfall. Just as fragile, these two roomed mud and bamboo structures seemed capable of being swept away from the hillside with the next downpour. The new party which had swept the hills of Darjeeling, also overnight, had been responsible for this sprawl. The strongmen of the area, in their moment of generosity had allotted the land on this side of the hill to the daily wage labourers and other such lost out folk. Of course nothing was done without paying the customary tax, which in this case was not much. These were mostly unemployed young men in rising numbers in each neighbourhood. So they had acquired the rights to become tough by partaking in a couple of odd brawls here and there. Sometimes they sought the affiliation of those who were already the known musclemen in these areas. You only had to take one look at the latter to see the claims to their power and pungency. God-gifted gym-toned physique and an attitude spelling conquest over half the world. Donning sleeveless uppers in defiance, be it summer or winter. Some tried to work the shock and awe effect through Mohawk dyed hairstyles, a robust mix of orange and purple too. Manpari meant the freedom to do whatever you want, but in this case it was understood that the freedom was just to build houses on unpaid for land. The inhabitants took the original meaning a little too seriously though and soon started doing Manpari. It grew into a hotbed of the three original distractions, gambling, drinking, fighting, and in that order too. During dasain (dusherra), all three increased tenfold and some of the wiser inhabitants had the farsight to hide the belcha, faruwa, jhampal , now weapons of ruin, which in other times had helped them to earn a livelihood. The hills were seething. From within too. Mexico was the name given by some ingenious person to a couple of such houses clustered together that engaged in these activities. Daily acts. Hourly deeds. May be someone who would watch those cowboy movies a couple of decades earlier, during the heyday of the Novelty Cinema Hall came up with such a name. Anyway, the name had stuck and the respectable inhabitants of the upper part of the hill towering over Manpari Busty, reincarnated it as Mexico village. Though they could not screen the noise that emanated from the hurly burly, the busty itself was carefully shaded from sight by the huge expanse of bans ghari—thick bamboo growth. Bans ghari had great covering powers. It was them masking and engulfing the hills of North Bengal from the rest of the state. Jeevan Mistery lived in the busty. From a helper he had graduated to a mistery but the money from his days had all been drained in the Raini’s raksi dokan–liquor joint. The young Bengali mistery, Tapan, was taking over all his contracts and now he was demoted to a be helper in Tapan’s camp. What a fall! If this wasn’t enough, his wretched, young son was becoming an alcoholic at the father’s expense. Everyone had envied his good fortune in having just one child. And that too, a son. Not too many mouths to feed, they had said with envy. This good for nothing Sooraj had dropped out of school at the eighth standard and what a reason he had cited! He couldn’t bear the gauri beth–cane stick– beatings anymore, he explained. (The rumour was that the government school received a truckload of gauri beth from Siliguri every year for the maintenance of discipline and other necessities of life.) Jeevan Mistery had been inwardly happy. It meant a helping hand in his trade, and who better than one’s one son. He wouldn’t have to pay the helper’s salary. But a fellow who had left school because he couldn’t bear the gauri beth wasn’t going to stick around in this trade where he was being worked like an ox. And Raini’s Aangan beckoned him, all the time. Sweetly. Piercingly. Raini was the army widow who was kicked out from the in-laws once the husband was killed in one of those India Pakistan wars, and she now lived here making, selling, living liquor. There was no compound, no enclosure. Any space outside the closely built houses belonged to the inhabitants. The liberating commons. Raini’s Aangan—in this piece of land, the gambling groups would assemble here after lunch. The women cursed more. The men got more physical. That has not changed here for centuries. Transformation, that the community fought and hoped for, always had to happen, from within such thick patina of damning habit. So, they had to be discrete—the male and female gambling groups, for the tenor of the fights took singular contours in each group. But sometimes when the liquor tasted exceptionally good, all such rules were broken, and everyone fought with everyone else. Sooraj was a gambler on the rise. It didn’t take him even a week to master the intriguing rules of rummy. As was customary, the winnings were deposited in the liquor shop. Thus the little economic cycle ran. Things were going well and smooth. But then the strike was called, indefinitely. The hills were seething from without. With the junta curfew, people from more respectable neighbourhoods, who used to frequent the liquor shop, first trickled and then stopped coming altogether. Raini had her local customers but they weren’t enough to sustain a living. So she raised the price. Sooraj’s gambling money soon dried up. Early morning was Jeevan Mistery’s time to appease the kul deutas. No matter what, the kul, kept in small mud kitchen outside the house, should never be incensed. Who knows what fury might unleash otherwise! Presently, the son showed up.